Land cover change and fire damage monitoring using ERS-1/2 SAR multi-temporal data sets in East-Kalimantan, Indonesia

A large number of ERS-1/2 SAR scenes of the East-Kalimantan test site of the October 1993-November 1996 period have been studied in support of the INDonesian Radar Experiment (INDREX-96), with the objective to study its potential for land cover change monitoring. Subsequently, an additional series of ERS-2 SAR scenes was acquired in support of studies to assess fire damage caused by a severe Fl Nino event, occurring at the same rest site in the period June 1997-April 1998. The result shows that fire affected areas can be delineated well, but that it is sometimes hard to estimate the intensity of the fire damage accurately. Combining ERS-2 SAR observations during the fire period with land cover class information obtained by ERS-1/2 SAR in the pre-fire period and observations of 'hotspots' by NOAA-AVHRR, together with knowledge on the types of fire occurring in this area, can be shown to yield very reliable results.